Iran lawmakers make plea for Karroubi paper

Nearly a week after Iranian authorities shut down a Reformist newspaper belonging to a former Parliament speaker, members of Iran's Majlis call on the Judiciary to lift the ban on the paper.

Etemad-e-Melli (National Trust) daily -- belonging to leading opposition figure Mehdi Karroubi -- was ordered closed after publishing a letter by the Reformist cleric claiming that jailers brutally 'raped' post-vote prisoners in Iran's detention centers.

An investigating judge at the Civil Servants Prosecution Office, which handles press cases, said that Karroubi's popular newspaper had been ordered shut until further notice for what was described as "publishing unlawful and criminal material."

In a letter to the newly-appointed Judiciary Chief Ayatollah Sadeq Larijani, a number of Majlis lawmakers rejected any unfairness in reporting stories by the banned daily.

"Throughout these times, this paper -- critical of the government -- has acted as a supervisory organ seeking to promote the climate of [constructive] criticism without any deviation from fairness," read the letter to the Judiciary.

"Since the people received the news of the daily shutdown on your first day of taking office and the last day of Ayatollah Hashemi-Shahroudi [former judiciary chief] in office, we, the representatives of the people in Majlis, ask you to issue an order so that related authorities take prompt action to lift the ban on this popular daily," the Iranian lawmakers asked Larijani.

Days after Iranian authorities closed down the Etemad-e-Melli daily, reports emerged that the defeated presidential candidate has plans to establish a satellite TV network, called Saba.